The Toronto-based executive producer and distributor of a clever dramatic comedy about the world’s first lesbian couple to conceive children without men hopes its premiere at Montreal’s World Film Festival will garner international interest in the low-budget mockumentary.

‘The film has lots of potential,’ Grindstone Media principal Paul Zimic told Playback Daily shortly after The Baby Formula screened. ‘It speaks to many different things. It’s about parenting and family. But it challenges traditional attitudes with humor. Let’s face it, it’s hard to get mad at a baby.’

The film tells the story of a married lesbian couple who want to conceive their own biological child. Much to the surprise and dismay of their extended family, they take a chance on an experimental scientific process and make sperm from their own stem cells.

Since its opening at WFF, The Baby Formula — made with a mere $275,000 — has charmed the Montreal media, with one journalist deeming it one of the festival’s best flicks.

Directed by former stunt person Alison Reid and starring Megan Fahlenbock (Resident Evil: Apocalypse) and Angela Vint (Lars and the Real Girl), the frequently hilarious film charts the couple’s dramatic journey, which is tracked by a documentary film crew and includes a brilliant performance by Rosemary Dunsmore as Athena’s very religious mother Wanda, who accuses the pair of trying to play God by hijacking the concept of immaculate conception.

The script is by Richard Beattie. Producers include Reid, Stephen Adams and James Mou.

‘Often the first reaction people have to this film is that it’s anti-male because it’s two women having a child without a guy, but that’s not my intention,’ Reid tells Playback Daily. ‘It’s really about two people in love. It’s normal that they want to have their own biological children,’ explains the director, who based the feature on a short film called Succubus starring the same actresses.

Reid came up with the idea after reading an article on female-only reproduction in mice the 1990s. Zimic hopes interest in the ‘science’ of same-sex reproduction will draw audiences. The production has posted related scientific articles on its website.

The Montreal World Film festival ends Sept. 1.